An award-winning daily feature writer has helped a former international footballer write his autobiography.

Lee Marlow, of the Leicester Mercury, teamed up with former Leicester City and Turkey midfielder Muzzy Izzet to co-write Muzzy: My Story, which is due to hit the shelves in September.

The book, which has been written over the course of three years, tells the story of how Izzet went from growing up on the same East London street where the Krays lived to representing Turkey at the 2002 World Cup, via rejection at Chelsea and a glittering career with Leicester City.

The book’s foreword is written by City’s former manager Martin O’Neill, who presided over what is arguably the most successful era in the club’s history.

Muzzy Izzet (left) with Leicester Mercury feature writer Lee Marlow

In a piece publicising the book, Lee, himself a City supporter, wrote: “A word of advice. You might be wise to give me an especially wide berth in the coming weeks.

“I plough a narrow furrow of tedious conversational topics at the best of times – work, football, kids, old rock music, what I’m having for my tea. I’d love to pretend it’s more elevating than that, but it’s not.

“From September, I suspect all of these red-hot topics of top-drawer chat will take a back seat. Because September is the month Muzzy Izzet’s book comes out.

“I’d be looking forward to that if I hadn’t written it.”

Lee, who won the Feature Writer prize at May’s Regional Press Awards, added: “I like Muzzy Izzet. He was my favourite player of the Martin O’Neill era, and the Dave Bassett/Micky Adams eras, too, although, admittedly, there’s less of a choice to be made there.

“But because I have written it, and it’s taken us a long time to write it, to get it right, there’s a small chance (who am I kidding – a massive chance) I will be incapable of talking about anything else.

“It’s taken three years to write this book. Three years. Yeah, I know. Barbara Cartland would have knocked out a small library in that time. People have built houses in less time, entire housing estates, in fact.

“But we took it steady. He has a day job. I have a day job. So we’d meet up when we could, have a drink and some food and we’d chat for a couple of hours and then I’d try to turn it into something and hope that one chapter would vaguely lead on to the next.

“Somehow, it’s just about worked.”

While at Leicester, between 1996 and 2004, Izzet won promotion to the Premier League as well as two League Cups.

He later went on to play for Birmingham City before retiring due to injury in 2006, and now runs a football academy in Leicestershire with fellow former City legend Steve Walsh.

He played eight times for Turkey, including a substitute appearance in the 2002 World Cup semi-final against Brazil.

Muzzy: My Story, published by Trinity Mirror Sport Media, will be out in September, priced £16.99 and will be available from book shops and on Kindle.